Paul Freedman, teaching Yale's course on the Early Middle Ages, examines Augustine's Confessions as both a personal document and a window into the intellectual life of Late Antiquity. He opens with a brief biography before turning to how Augustine wrestled with the problem of evil, moving through Manichaeism and Neoplatonism before settling on a Christian framework. A central episode is Augustine's memory of stealing pears as a boy, which Freedman uses to unpack Augustine's conception of sin as something rooted in will rather than need. The lecture closes on Augustine's rejection of perfectionism, his emphasis on grace, and his view of sin as an ineradicable condition rather than a problem to be solved. Delivered as a standard classroom lecture with chapter markers, it treats the Confessions as a source for understanding early Christian doctrine on evil, the soul-body relationship, and redemption.